


Azurrin week 2018 prompts

by Starbat



Category: Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Azurrin Week 2018, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-11
Updated: 2018-09-13
Packaged: 2019-07-11 00:02:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15960398
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starbat/pseuds/Starbat
Summary: No matter what choices they face, they'll face them together, looking their fate head-on.----------------------------------------------Day 3: The two had come out to the lake where Corrin met Azura after the former had shamefully admitted that, like her eldest Nohrian brother, she hadn’t the slightest clue how to swim. Azura offered to help, but hadn’t realized that the process would be quite so....pathetic, to watch.





	1. blessing/curse

**Author's Note:**

> whats up gays im back from bein dead for like 4 months to barely drag my decaying body ahead of the azurrin week deadline  
> asjdfhsjkghk GOD i rly cut it close tho... it's 11:42 as im typing this and only god knows if ill get a proper summary up in time to post this before midnight here lmao
> 
> anyway im also still working on runaways i promise, i just hit another roadblock as i Always Do on the non plot chapters LMAO....i swear once i get past the fluff back into plot territory ill update faster lmao. also im gonna try to hit all 7 days this week but idk if ill make it perfectly on time!! i have. work and stuff lol
> 
> that said here take this! this one is for the curse/blessing prompt and its like lowkey more edgy than i rly wanted it to be but hey. shrug emoji. deadline is a cruel mistress and i didnt have time to edit more bc i foolishly started this like 2 days before i knew id need it finished
> 
> ALSO edit just so we r all on the same page. theyre not cousins here because thats fucken gross lmfao. my personal thots are that mikoto was either high nobility in valla or a retainer, but not. royalty herself. bc no blue hair. thanks for coming to my ted talk and remember incest bad

In this world, all actions have consequence. If you kick a dog, you will be bitten. If you trample upon the hearts of others, you will be an outcast. 

If you speak of Valla, you die. 

She’s puzzled over the nature of that curse since she learned it existed - since she watched her mother vanish, into nothing, before her eyes. After some time, she thinks she’s figured it out. 

The burden of Valla - the endless, streaming fountain of hatred and guilt, buried so deep in the world as to become invisible - is a fate approaching that of death. Ever since hearing of its existence, Azura has been hounded by consequences for ignoring it.

Who was she to try and live, childishly, on the surface in Nohr, when it was her responsibility to save those toiling in Valla? And so she was taunted and wounded mercilessly. 

How could she justify it? Turning her back on others, becoming aloof. Even in Hoshido she was hardly there, ever-present, melancholy. Pretty backdrop to the royal family, a phantom girl with neither agency nor energy. Passive, polite, perfect for speaking with. A stand-in sister until they could get the real one back.

She didn’t mind, really. Most of the time she even enjoyed it. She liked to think the reprieve had been earned through her occasional visits to Valla, the occasional attempts on her life that always ended up thwarted. Bitter consequence and sweet reward canceling each other out to create the void she lived in, a world absent of strife and pleasure alike. Existence, for its own sake, with no one privy to her heart. 

A handful of relationships at arms’ length don’t mean anything, a handful of enemies mean even less. A country full of breathless, voiceless soldiers coming to kill her fails to make a dent in her composure: her walls have been built expressly for such things. Forgetting how to feel pain is as easy as forgetting a poem one had to memorize.

That’s how it is - until Corrin comes crashing into her life with all the grace and tact of an earthquake. 

She’d like nothing more than to protect her - to keep the creeping darkness and the harsh rays of light alike from ailing her. Ever since they met, Corrin has been nothing but kind, lacking both the wary suspicion and the endless pity of the others she’d met. Perhaps Azura becomes smitten too easily, or perhaps that is another of Corrin’s unique qualities - that dazzling smile, as radiant as a Hoshidan sunrise and colorful as a Nohrian aurora in the night sky. The immeasurable charm of two wholly separate nations in unison. 

Yes, Azura would like nothing more than to protect that sort of person. Even if it means further drenching herself in curses...no matter how difficult Corrin makes it. It’s been such a long time since anything cracked through the passive veneer she’d carved out for herself. It can’t be for nothing; Azura can’t dismiss it as a coincidence. 

“I won’t betray anyone - both of you, stand down!”

Nobody will listen to reason; the harmony Corrin wishes to represent falls on deaf ears. Somehow they struggle through the battlefield, an army of four against legions, but she can tell Xander and Ryoma alike were going terribly easy on Corrin. They have to retreat before things get serious, and where could they possibly run to?

Azura takes them to Valla, even though her heart aches at the thought of Corrin suffering the same curse as herself. If it’s this or be killed, then they haven’t got a choice. 

The campaign they launch is horrifically ambitious, an attempt to get the royalty of nations that have been at war since conception to agree on anything, let alone believe them without a shred of proof - but Corrin makes it happen. Azura stays faithfully by her side all the while, supporting her with her song, no matter the toll it takes on her body. If she stays out of sight, this particular curse is one that can be kept to herself...one fewer burden for her to bear.

Shocks of pain run up her arm, a haze of purple flashing in her mind.

This curse, unlike the knowledge of Valla, is Azura’s alone to bear.

The day the skies are switched -

Corrin is a vision, then, standing proudly at the lip of the canyon. Shoulders squared, and sword pointed resolutely at the abyss below, she holds her head as high as both the great knights of Nohr and swordmasters of Hoshido.

They plummet into the center of it all, facing demons and memories alike together, all the way up to the bitter end. Anankos is powerful, but the desires of so many people in harmony - the strength of an army working as one unit - proves the victor. Azura’s throat is hoarse from singing, her legs ache from dancing. At the end of the battle, somehow, Corrin finds enough strength remaining to help Azura up. “Need a hand?” She grins.

“We did it...” Azura grasps, a bit pathetically, at Corrin’s hand, but it’s enough for Corrin to pull her up with. “Valla - the war - it’s,” huff, “Over... it’s really over...”

Corrin giggles. “Well, at least that’s the hard part over with, right?” She pulls Azura in closer, propping her up now on her shoulder, holding her closely by the side while she surveys their army - ragged and made up of recruits from all places. “Now we have the easy stuff - negotiating all the peace treaties, rehousing the homeless from the war, rebuilding Valla...”

She laughs again, this time nervously. “Who knew peace was so much work, huh? Hey, Azura, I know you’re tired, but....when we’re all healed up, could you stay with me a little longer...?”

“I would love nothing more.” It’s the truth, too. But when Corrin smiles, that same brilliant shine she’s had since they met, it’s because she misunderstands Azura’s words. Azura, of course, would love dearly to stay by Corrin’s side. 

Whether or not she will is an entirely different matter.

Based on that last battle, the rebound from her singing will be....tremendous. Azura’s not entirely certain she’ll live through it. It could strike at any time...even now, with Corrin grounding her on this earth, she could evaporate into nothing in moments. 

Part of her is scared of what will happen if she  _ doesn’t _ disappear; of the things regarding herself that will have to be brought up, time and time again. If the Nohrian family will make her an outlet for guilt, or the Hoshidan family will forget to include her until the last moments, or worse, remember - if the people she’d shut herself off from this whole time had cared more than she had, and she’d have to admit that to herself. 

It’s two days after the fight, in the barely held-together palace Valla, that Azura makes her suggestion. 

“You should become Queen in my stead, Corrin.”

Corrin looks up from the letters she’s been poring over since morning, treaties and papers delivered by Leo and Takumi, both seeking the best for their families and nations, requests for aid from all the further tribes, reports of damages, letters requesting identification of the deceased. Even through all the drudgery, Corrin has withheld from complaining, as long as she knows it is for the peace she desires - but now she seems more a confused child than a responsible diplomat. “Huh? Why would I do that? You’re the one with rights to the crown, even if my father technically held rulership last.”

Sighing, Azura paces up to the desk Corrin sits at, setting the crown she’d retrieved down on top of the paperwork. “I’d be a terrible Queen. It’s unfair to the people to have such a person on the throne. Everyone likes you quite well, though. I think you should accept.”

“Hey, don’t say things like that. You’re amazing, Azura. You’re kind, and smart, and firm in your beliefs... I think that you’re  _ exactly _ the type of person Valla needs on the throne right now.” In a placating voice, Corrin attempts to reassure Azura - and is she so infirm that she can be swayed by words alone? Corrin reaches to comfort physically, to hold hands and lace their fingers together as they have so many times before - but Azura turns away. 

She folds her arms, averting her eyes. “You have all the same qualities and more, Corrin. I fear I pale in comparison.”

Corrin stands up, now more determined than ever. “But that’s not true! I’m not as smart as you, and I’m too easily fooled - not to mention how I don’t think ahead! If you hadn’t been with me, we never would have made it this far! You always keep your head in a crisis, and you know just the right way to calm people down... you’re gentle, and pretty...” she sighs, shaking her head. “I could talk forever and it still wouldn’t be enough.”

“Even if that is the case, I cannot be Queen, because my reign would be painfully short.” Azura admits, finally biting the truth out. She’d considered at length not giving any warning at all, so that her last memories of Corrin might be happy ones, but would that really help Corrin? 

She can suffer a few painful last days if it means Corrin has an easier time finding her peace with it.

The statement, as anticipated, puts Corrin on immediate alert. “What do you mean? Why?”

“I will die soon. That is the nature of my curse - the consequence I must face for drawing on Valla’s power so often. The same curse Anankos laid that made speaking of this place forbidden...it drained the life from me each time I performed my song.” Tears prick at the corners of her eyes; hasn’t she been prepared for this kind of fate since a young age? Why does she choose now to cry over it? 

The distance between the two of them is closed suddenly, and gloved hands reach up to wipe Azura’s tears. “Is that all...? It’s okay. You don’t have anything to worry about anymore.”

“Corrin,” Azura grits out, “You don’t understand. I  _ will _ die from this, even if it’s not immediate. This is not a fate so easily avoided with words. There is no sword, no sage, and no remedy that can cure my fate. This is the consequence I face for abusing my powers.”

“I might be a little slow, but I’m not stupid. I understand perfectly.” Corrin releases her hold on Azura, meeting her eyes with a steadfast gaze. “And I mean exactly what I said. You don’t have to worry anymore.”

“ _ Corrin _ ,” Azura says, almost angrily, because how can Corrin be so positive in a time like this?

Corrin turns her head so that she’s facing the window, and cocks it. “Azura, can you remind me who cast that curse?”

“Anankos.” She says, biting back the urge to ask what she could be driving at, what foolish trivia she thinks she’s found that can help avoid a fate as certain as death. 

Corrin hums, bringing her hands to the windowsill. “My father,” She says, voice clear, “Is the one that laid the curse on Valla. And if what I’ve learned is correct, he was the ancestral guardian of this place, too - the one who gave Vallite rulers their powers, and protected this place from others, at least until he went crazy. Right?”

Mutely, Azura nods, even though Corrin isn’t facing her.

Her fingers tense around the windowsill anyway. “So we killed him, and that leaves Valla without a guardian. Hoshido and Nohr have the Dawn and Dusk dragons, even if they’re dead. Valla needs a new one - as the only dragon around, and presumed next in line...that guardian is me.” Corrin lifts her head and turns to face Azura, red eyes flashing passionately. “Valla is under _my_ protection, and _you_ are its ruler and I will not let a curse take _you_ from _me_!” 

Azura wants to move to refute it, but even if she had, it wouldn’t have mattered. As if in resonance with Corrin’s voice, her pendant begins to glow - as does Corrin’s dragonstone, shining brightly out from the cracks of Corrin’s armor. 

Almost clumsily, Corrin huries to take it out from its hiding place and bring them together - it doesn’t look like it actually does anything, but the shining of both stones in unison is a sight to see. The shining stops, and Corrin looks breathlessly between the dragonstone and Azura. “W-well? Did that do anything?”

“...Frankly, I don’t have the slightest idea of what that did.” Azura admits, blush creeping up her neck to her cheeks. “You truly are full of surprises...”

Corrin turns her head away. “Well!  _ I  _ think that was the little tiny dragonstone in that necklace acknowledging me! Which means I make the divine rules now! So as Valla’s protector, I hereby decree you blessed with, uhh, a super long life! And no more bedhead! Oh, oh, and every meal you eat is only half as filling so you can try everything on the table!”

Azura pinches the bridge of her nose. “Corrin, I don’t think blessings work quite the way you think they do....nor curses, for that matter.”

“Do you not feel un-cursed? Should I try and make it glow again?” Corrin’s eyes gleam, and even under the overeager grin Azura can see the worry there - she doesn’t doubt that she  _ could _ pull it off, as many times as was needed, until somehow she could be certain the curse was lifted.

Maybe that’s what Corrin managed to convey - this feeling in her chest, so different from that of the curse taking hold of her...

Despite herself, Azura smiles. “Actually...I think you have lifted it.” 

Corrin beams, and wraps her arms tightly around Azura, head filling the space between Azura’s neck and shoulder like it was made to rest there, and Azura comes away from the hug feeling distinctly  _ blessed _ .


	2. dark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is really short but makes up for it by being, in my professional opinion, REEALLLY CUTE...... shoutout to Me for picking dark so i could make a fluff prompt........
> 
> for real though i feel like mellow nighttime moments are very underappreciated in terms of fluff...it's not something I think I can easily capture in such a short time span, but feeling like you're just, yknow, existing in the same room as someone you care about at night....knowing their bedtime routine n waking up and knowing they'll be there in the morning, or even just being able to hold them... i think it's a very nuanced and sweet kind of romance! haha anyways not 2 be Crass or Vulgar but writing this made me want to cuddle w someone too lmao

Her footsteps are light as she pads across the castle ground, still barefoot - a habit she has no care to break, despite her title of consort. Halls flicker this way and that in the torchlight, nearly beckoning, cheerful in their reception of her. Her shadow slinks along the wall beside her, as if exploring every doorway not taken on the way to her destination. 

The window on this floor of the castle opened out to the valley below the castle, and Corrin peered through out of habit - since the defeat of Anankos, much of what had once been floating debris managed to settle back into more manageable land, though some rocky islands, high above the ground or deep in abysses, persisted. Since the area around the castle had always been the most well preserved, most survivors lived as near it as they dared already, and it made rounding them up and offering shelter a fair deal easier. 

Little lights gleam from above and below, the twinkling of stars and the waving of torchlight in a breeze working in concjunction. 

Satisfied, Corrin proceeds on her way to the royal chambers. 

The door opens with hardly a creak - they’d oiled the hinges only recently, hadn’t they? - and Corrin slides inside to close it to near total-darkness. Azura had already put out the candle for the night, it seems. 

A smile plays across Corrin’s face.

A bit of darkness can’t do much to stop her in her tracks. After a moment’s pause, her eyes adjust, and despite the fact that her father ended up being a terrible monster, she thanks him, just a bit, for passing along the draconic eyesight that lets her take this in even in the low light.

The candlesmoke still lingers in the upper corners of the room; Corrin silently moves to the window and cracks it open a tad so it can escape. There’s a couple dozen papers rolled up beside the nightstand, and a few of those odd Hoshidan books that face the wrong direction propped up beside those, and upon the nightstand proper sits the ornate, criclet-crown of Valla. 

Knowing Azura, she didn’t spend long with it on before setting it there once she retired for the night. Even now, she retains a spectacular degree of modesty, which Corrin appreciates, but cannot understand. 

What could Azura possibly have to be modest about? She’s stunning, in mind, body and  _ especially _ heart. The crown was, quite literally, made to rest upon her head. Even though being the leader of a nation isn’t something to be taken lightly, Corrin thinks (and perhaps this is a point of pride for herself as well) that Azura does look entirely regal in her royal attire. 

Her eyes drift to the final, most important detail in this room: Azura. 

Azura lies on the bed, splayed out but never quite broaching Corrin’s side, head facing the doorway. Her hair, wild and blue and soft as silk even after all the time its been since they met, seems almost haphazard against the bed, streaks of blue emerging from her head like sunbeams. Corrin often has to move it when she gets in - Azura will toss it over her shoulder to read, but Corrin doesn’t want to just  _ lay _ on it and risk pulling in the night, so she moves it so it’s atop Azura’s stomach. 

For her hair to fall in this way, she probably went straight for bed after working at the desk. It’s not her usual pose. And she must have been really tired, too... Corrin lets her eyes linger on Azura’s expression, when her brow isn’t tensed and she isn’t frowning or serious, and feels a little flutter of something in her chest.

She’s so lucky to be able to see this despite the darkness. 

The moment can’t last as long as she wishes, though, and soon that beloved, contented expression of Azura’s turns into one Corrin adores even more - a smile. 

Azura cracks an eye open. “Well? Will you stand there at the foot of our bed all night, or do you intend to join me?”

“I’ll think about it,” Corrin chirrups back, even as she starts to climb onto her side of the bed - she’d gotten into her nightgown long before - and presses a kiss to the corner of Azura’s forehead. “You’re very cute when you’re tired, you know...?”

“Am I not cute to you at all other hours?” Azura muses in a sleepy voice. “Do you think so little of my charms in the day?”

“W-w-what, I mean - ?!” Sputtering, Corrin nearly flies off the bed in surprise, but Azura’s fit of giggles draws her right back down with a scowl. “How cruel, Azura..”

She giggles. “I wish it weren’t so terribly dark in here. I’d have loved to see the face you made just now.”

Whining just a bit, Corrin nestles her head into Azura’s hair, wrapping an arm tightly around her side. “I’m glad it’s so dark. I get to see you all relaxed.” 

“I’m relaxed rather often with you by my side.” She replies, easing herself yet further into Corrin’s grasp. “Nearly as much as I am now.”

“But only nearly.” Corrin specifies, closing her eyes as she makes herself comfortable around Azura. “This you - I’m the only one who can see it. Even if someone else were to come in, it’d be too dark. In a way, that’s romantic, isn’t it?”

Azura laughs. “I suppose it is.”

Queen and Consort, the two rest together in the darkened room. 


	3. fear

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is coming about 10 minutes after the deadline lmao sdkjfhsg im sorry day 3....i had work today......
> 
> oh also the prompt was used. pretty loosely today, im writing all of these day-of which again! was SUPER stupid of me! but yeah i went with fear and wrote this because i was feeling something more lighthearted today. also i know its not canon that corrin can't swim but i really dont see a wealth of swimming opportunities at castle krakenburg and of course everyone and their mother knows + thinks it's hilarious that xander can't swim already, so y not just merge the two things! is what i thought when i was scrambling for a way to fill the prompt after getting home from work sjkdghjskghj

“Okay....Okay, you can do this. Just breathe. This time...this time is definitely it!” Red eyes snap open, and Corrin stares down her foe with the intensity one might expect from a fierce dragon; she is determined to vanquish this foe once and for all. 

Azura shoots her an amused look. “So this time you’ll definitely get in the lake? I could have sworn it was last time you said that...”

“D-don’t rush me! I’m going to get in, I just need to prepare....”

The two had come out to the lake where Corrin met Azura after the former had shamefully admitted that, like her eldest Nohrian brother, she hadn’t the slightest clue how to swim. Azura offered to help, but hadn’t realized that the process would be quite so....painful to watch. 

Corrin routinely psyched herself up to get into the lake, only to make contact with the water above her chest and bail by the time it reached her armpits. Azura had shown by example plenty of times, but until Corrin actually got in.... “Learning to swim won’t kill you, you know.”

Pouting, Corrin folds her arms. “ _ Drowning _ might, though.” She mumbles.

Azura sighs. “Are you certain you wouldn’t like to just hold on to me and wade out a bit further? I’m a plenty strong swimmer.”

“...And you won’t let go of me?” Corrin asks, meekly. It’s a little pathetic, seeing the wielder of the Yato brought to a state like this over what amounts to a glorified pond.

“You have my word.” She replies, holding a hand out for Corrin to take. 

They’re already about waist-deep in the water, so when Corrin takes her hand, Azura beins wading out further. Corrin’s grip on her hand tightens the closer they get to the point where their feet will cease to touch the ground - as they nearly reach it, Corrin sputters. 

“Wait! W-wait, turn around!”

A wicked grin flashes across Azura’s face. “Truly, I’m sorry....but the only way to learn is to practice!” And with that, she yanks Corrin out towards the center of the lake with herself, still holding firm to her arm if not her hand. 

Corrin’s flailing might sink them both, but Azura is confident enough in her swimming skills that if she can get her to stop, it will be a simple task to pull them both back to land. 

The flailing persists, Corrin yelping pitifully as she watches land drift further. “Put me back! Put me back - aaaaaaAAGH -!”

Corrin abruptly stops flailing, only to suddenly float to the surface of the water - and it’s not because she learned to float on her back, either. 

Telltale, glimmering signs of her transformation sparkle through the water, and Azura finds herself hanging on to the arm of a completely buoyant, dragon-sized  _ coward _ . Now relieved and on water-repellent feet, Corrin preens and tries to make way back to land. 

“Really, now. Aren’t you ashamed of yourself at all?”

Corrin makes a sound that doesn’t seem entirely ashamed, crooning pitifully in Azura’s direction, and, treading water in the depths, Azura makes a split second decision. 

Clearing her throat first, she begins to sing, high notes, going through a simple vocal warm up before setting her eyes on the water Corrin is standing atop. She lowers her pitch, feeling the magic she wields with the use of the pendant flow through the water. 

Everything Corrin is standing on sinks below her feet, dropping the dragon into the water. Now she’s  _ seriously _ flailing, and Azura has to dive to avoid being clocked upside the head with her thrashing tail. “ _ AZURRAAAAAA!”  _  Corrin whines, voice distorted by the dragonstone.

“Fulfil your promise! Get in the water, or I’ll drench you!” Azura ‘threatens’, leading to more theatrics and complaints.

Eventually she argues the point back into Corrin, who turns back to her human size and cautiously approaches the deeper end where she can stand - the point at which Azura guides her physically, moving her arms for her and showing her how to kick properly. Despite all the sulking, she’s a rather apt learner, and despite being unwilling to go much further, she’s now skilled enough to Not Drown, so Azura calls it a day as far as swimming lessons go and wades back up to shore, wringing her hair out all the while. 

Corrin all but raced her back up, besides. “I’m sorry for being such a pain!” She apologizes, practically bent over in a bow - something she picked up from Sakura, hilariously enough. “Thank you for teaching me.”

“Honestly... the way you were acting, I nearly forgot this was your idea.” Shaking her head, Azura puts a hand on Corrin’s shoulder. “I’m happy to help you however I can...but next time, just get in the water, okay?”

“I know, I know... I just didn’t want to tell the others I wasn’t going to the beach because I can’t swim, you know? They’d be so disappointed... and I’d be so bored!” Corrin grabs onto Azura’s arm playfully. “Now that I can sort of swim, we can do all sorts of fun stuff too!”

“Oh really?” Azura goads her on. “Like what?”

Corrin shoots her a fanged grin. “Well, when you were showing me how to move my arms it was pretty nice...but we can do that much on land, too. Like here -” 

She unceremoniously takes hold of Azura’s hands, then pulls her arms up over her shoulders to rest around them before darting in for a kiss. 

She grins. “My, aren’t you charming. Trying to make up for your fit?”

Corrin’s face goes red. “...Maybe a bit.”

“We’ll have time for that tomorrow - after the second lesson.”

With a hopeless sigh, Corrin follows Azura away from the lake. This was her idea, after all - she has to get over her fear eventually. 


End file.
